


I Can Feel it on the tip of your Tongue

by soundslikefire



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Drunkenness, Fights, M/M, Multi, Prompt Fic, Rich Liam, Songfic, Student Harry, Student Louis, Student Niall, Uni AU, University Student Zayn, Walking, hints of ziam, preppy, zayn finds liam attractive
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-30
Updated: 2013-10-30
Packaged: 2017-12-30 22:02:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1023896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soundslikefire/pseuds/soundslikefire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thats just the way the gang does it, saturdays (and some fridays too) zayn sings and niall dicks around, Louis is their self proclaimed manager (and part time key boardist) and harry might just get a record deal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Can Feel it on the tip of your Tongue

**Author's Note:**

> Just A fic based of of the song Barlights. ooh and bonus! its the longest thing I've published!

It's loud and sweaty and full of girls and dancing and too close crotches and Zayn loves it. He can smell the exhilaration and b.o. He can almost taste the blood and alcohol on his tongue, and cheap perfume that makes him gag. It's fulfilling, Zayn thinks, raising his glass. It's some waste of a drink sloshing around everyone's heads.

He loves the Saturday nights right after gigs, in shitty bars, far from the uni gates. He loves Niall, singing too loud and accent too thick past eleven. He loves Louis and how surprisingly hard his little fists are when he really gets upset. He loves Harry, though thats not surprising as everyone does.

Zayn enjoys the fourth barstool in from the right. It's seat is just a screw too loose and allows him to swivel all the way around, so he can really take in everything. He likes how the seat is just a bit higher than the factory standard so he can see Ed and Niall, drunkenly bellowing out ballads.

Harry pushes his way over to him, eyes sparkling, with his hair just a little lank with sweat. "Zayn!" Zayn grinds back at him as Harry swings a long skinny arm over his shoulder wrapping around just under his armpit. This kids gotta be on some sort of major drugs, Zayn always thought about him. He was too skinny and model tall. Coke could do it, or meth. But what students have time or money to sustain an addiction?

Harry smiles again, so his mouth gets all angular, the way Zayn loves. "Buddy! Hows your night been?!" Harry yells loudly, and faster than he usually does talk which Zayn thinks is always a plus. He presses a big sloppy kiss to the side of Zayn’s cheek, it’s slobbery as warm, as it catches the very corner of Zayn's lips. Harry pulls back cheekily and wipes off his cheek. "You looked a bit sad." He remarks, leaning in close so Zayn can hear him better.

Zayn shakes his head. "'Course not Haz, just thinking."

"Well dont. You seem like you’re in a tither." Zayn shakes his head, chortling. He very much appreciates words that Harry uses when no one else does. Probably as part of his hipster coalition shit. Words that would probably be lost to the english language if not for celebrations at this shit pub. Harry frowns when he doesn't answer. "Do you want to leave?" Zayn frowns slightly.

"No, I don't think so." He picks his drink up and moves it over a bit, and wipes his finger through the wet circle left behind.

"We could walk you home and you could maybe call Perrie and I dunno..." Harry grins a bit at the end, and Zayn almost fears the implication. He puts his head on the cool counter, sighing.

"Calling her isn't going to make me feel better." Zayn hears the stool next to him emit a squeak and jumps when Harry’s low bass vibrates his inner ear.

"Why not?" Harrys curls are tickling his ear, where they fold over. He hopes Lou isn't paying attention: he can still feel his knuckles in his arm.

Abruptly Zayn sits back up and grins, a new wave of nonsense washing over him. "Do you wanna go sing Haz?" Harry nods slowly. _(the truth is, I'm just getting started.)_

Zayn finds himself in front of a mic an hour later, on a shitty stage, raised maybe a foot above the floor. Along the edge of the makeshift curtains there are big old fairy lights. The actual bulb ones that Zayn also loves to add to his list, the kind in a bunch of colors that are glowing hot by the end of the night. Barlights. Certainly this is not what he (and certainly not his parents) had planned when he announced he was going to school for music. Or art. Something like that, yeah.

He's thinking something, hmm, Bruno mars, maybe tonight, except the bass is out, so all they have is Ed on guitar and this genuine guy from his trig class, Josh. And Niall, but when intoxicated about as reliable as the beat up amps they use on Friday nights. "Uhh, hi. We are..." Zayn pauses. Should they be the rouge, something louis insisted on, or some silly name Harry suggests ten minutes before they're bound to play? Zayn liked Niall's Spanish suggestion, until he had told them in fits of giggles it meant dildo. "We're Venus Trips." He can hear Louis's eye roll. Whatever, Zayn thought it covered the gangs recreational drug use and slight oddball mess nicely.

And Ed is strumming out the notes to some riling up sort of song, Latin sounding.

The lights are swimming before his eyes, and loves loves loves this noise they all can make, and he smiles smiles he wants people to hear it, its amazing. He wants people to hear Niall’s laugh or G chord that he fucks up when he can't see, or how Lou and Harry hold hands in science sometimes or just link pinkies when walking around campus. Or when he gets tired and he allows his head to rest on one of them in the back row of the lecture hall, but only Harry can touch his hair. He needs people to understand that this- this night is what he really lives for, after Louis's almost weekly tantrums when he bursts into their dorm and takes his frustration out on his math book. Zayn hiccups a little, and lets Harry take over for a while.

Zayn loves this absolute solid feeling of love and warmth. (and I feel alive.) He loves his own little universe spinning completely by itself and its complete and round and he gets a little sad. Why can't all people have this? Harry pats him on the back and and Zayn grins, clapping in time to his own set and song. He doesn't need her, or anyone, he’s got this empire built on the tiny sticks of Niall and Josh and Ed and Harry and that place they always order Chinese from and the basic Spanish class they all took together to get a language credit.

He leads himself off stage and out the door, a wave of the hand to the roar. He thinks he should let Lou know at least, just a cigarette. It's raining again like its been all week, thats kept everyone inside study or making out in the reference section. The ground is oddly bright, reflecting the lights from the street in all the the puddles that fill the bumps in the asphalt. He becomes cheeky for a moment and sticks the toe of his boot - Harry’s boot- in to the dainty stream that runs down hill, down over the pavement.

He feels a gush of warm air sweep up behind him and feels his armpits being dragged up. "Harry! Lou! Put me down immediately!" He hears Niall laugh and kicks his legs a little.

"Poor little Zayn. We can't let you be too happy without us!" Harry’s voice is always a bit raspier after gigs and Zayn allows himself to be steadied by his large hands. Louis loops up to his other side, and he can feel their interlocked hands behind his neck.

"Going home are we?" Louis asks, a little bird flitting around until Zayn reaches out to slap him, except his hand is wrapped around Harry’s waist. Louis begins to skip, if only to keep pace with the taller two, but Zayn chuckles nonetheless. Harry trods on his toes a few times, but hey, they're his boots.

"I think home is the other way," Nialls pipes up- Zayn had almost forgot he was with them!- not the least bit worried about their cocked sense of direction (or lack there of).

The streets start to get a little dimmer as the pubs become farther and farther apart. Lou keeps looping them around this way or that because he "could've sworn the uni green was just around the next corner." Nialls marching ahead determined to find god knows what in the few feet of sidewalk.

"Hey, remember when we all came here for uni and we saw Niall playing that shitty guitar, and Zayn walked out of the lobby of that expensive building all mad because he couldn't afford it," Louis is babbling again drunkenly but Zayn fondly finds it nostalgic. He had been stupid enough to come here to look for a flat instead of a dorm, and there he’d met Niall, smart enough to play in the rich neighborhood.

Louis and Harry were already _hazandlou_ at that point, a week in to their stupid year at uni. Louis was in this part of town trying to encourage his business (door to door sales, of course) because "I don't need a freaking business class!" Which ironically enough, he failed (also because Louis is not a people person). Rightfully so, in Zayn’s opinion, though he’d never tell Louis that. The "business" was really just Louis selling random shit he bought for cheap or sign-up scams. It wasn’t exactly legal but it made them all some easy money for books (and pot and alcohol).

Niall laughs and and shuffles along, while Zayn’s got a dull ache from holding up Louis's dense ass.

"Can we sit?" He pants, towing them to a bus stop bench. Louis pouts and complies, collapsing on it. Harry moves to the other side, and automatically lets Lou curl into him. Niall sits down next to zayn, both of them staring straight ahead into the midnight fog.

He thinks it's funny just how perfect this all turned out. There’s Louis who basically only goes to uni for the theatre but degrees are nice too. And Niall the champion at beer pong, yeah. Then Zayn, who really had no idea what he’s doing but for now thats okay. Harry’s the oldest, and calls himself the Shepherd, although feels he'd be most lost without them (or Louis at the very least).

Harry jumps, and Louis jostles into Zayn’s side mumbling. Wiggling his phone out of his black skinnies, Harry hits answer and gets up, taking a few steps forward, motioning ‘one minute,’ with that universal apologetic look all people on the phone get.

"It was just a demo so I -You liked it?!" His voice shoots up gleefully. Zayn doesn't quite catch the other side but that’s it. He says "yeah" and "ok" a few more times and hangs up. He bites his lip, grinning. There's no point it asking, this had been going on for a few weeks.

They get sleepy Lou up between them both with Niall spotting and walk a bit further because "that’s a frat house I swear!"

 Zayn cracks his back against Harry’s forearm and sighs a little, seeing the group up ahead. Most likely privates, sixth form, acting like they knew how to live life, from mum and dads house, stumbling out from a hotel swearing loudly and crinkly their perfectly pressed white collars and sporting their polos and everything else that they can possibly wear to set themselves apart from the uni kids. Louis sighs too and hisses just a bit and Harry just shakes his head. Niall is sadly a little too oblivious and knocks into a skinny kid, making him trip a little in his loafers. The kid looks absolutely appalled and Zayn snorts.

"Watch where you’re going!" The kid fixes himself. “Think this is fucking funny, huh?" Zayn tries to wipe the grin off his face. Harry steps forward, and pats Louis warningly on the shoulder.

"Hey, man. Sorry for my friend," Harry’s low voice does this thing that’s only slightly calming. He gestures vaguely between Zayn and Niall. "We all had a bit too much tonight and were just trying to get home." The skinny kid looks up at Harry (everyone looks up at him really) squinting. Zayn feels laughing wouldnt help but seriously? It's not that hard to understand what he just said. Kid must be thick.

"Yeah okay whatever," the snob goes back to his friends and Zayn carefully bows his head walking by, he doesn't need to get off another wrong foot. They're just about out if earshot when suddenly a pitched voice, clear as day says, "...probably poor; gonna drop out after this year, I'm telling you, and the freaking druggie. The Irish ones probably alcoholic like they all are..." Zayn feels two very swift bodies brush past him.

He closes his eyes. He can tell you exactly who’s rushing into battle. Louis, who had a pretty shitty dad with some drinking problems, and Niall, who worked his butt off for a scholarship purely off academics, so he can get his family out of the dump he came from. Funny how he pressed all the right buttons with all the wrong people. The idiot snorts.

"How bout you?" Zayn clenches his eyes close again. He opens them, as well as his fist, which he just as quickly clenches back. "I’m good thanks", he calls out. Harry grips his elbow. Zayn can feel it coming on, see it, Louis and Niall are back to back, being surrounded by this little gang of preps.

The first punch thrown misses, and Zayn can almost hear it whistle through air. The next one though, even Harry winces. It crunches a nose and Louis’s gargled shriek echoes.

"Fuck it," Zayn mutters and goes to pull them out of of it. Before he gets there this bulky guy is in his way.

"And where do you think your going?" Zayn tries to look over his shoulder, Niall yelps.

"Just trying to help get out of here." The big guy's got light brown hair, buzzed to his head. He shoves him back.

Zayn takes a step forward. "C'mon let’s have a go." He takes a step forward again, so they're almost chest to chest.

"And I said no." Zayn's hand is tightening again. "Fuck off."

And just like that, Zayn feels himself crumple down to the ground. It's wet and cold. And very solid. The kid had a big fucking fist in Zayn’s stomach. He can hear the sharps clicks of shoes against wet cement walk by and hear them laughing. Zayn’s eyes flutter close and they well up, shit that hurt. His cheek is going to have lots of gravel and dirt on it when he gets up, he knows (if he gets up). He smiles a bit- that was kind of exhilarating.

_Me, I’m gonna live forever_

He rolls onto his back; its uncomfortable with every pebble going right through the Tshirt. His eyes are crying, he didnt even know he was, but the streetlights are crossing over his eyes with his tears. He feels a bit free- it felt fucking good. _and for the first time_

He hears the others kneel down around him, and Louis off to a side shouting indignantly.

"The kid fucking broke my nose! My nose! I’m bleeding!" Zayn laughs _(In a long time)_. It's gotten colder and he can feel the breeze on his arms. What a fan-fucking-tastic night.

_I feel alive._

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Obviously i don't own one direction, nor have i ever been to university, England or a bar so.... and i'm shit at summaries so please! leave suggestions in the comments!


End file.
